Stage and screen reviews + a little rock ‘n’ roll

Is it my imagination or is the arts world slowing down a little, in preparation for the summer? Maybe it’s my own lethargy but I’ve seen fewer plays recently. However, I have some excellent recommendations for you, in case you’re looking for something to do this weekend.

ATC: The Project(s)

American Theater Company’s The Project(s) is a sad and celebratory docudrama about public housing in Chicago. Writer/director P.J. Paparelli interviewed more than 100 past and present residents of Chicago public housing as well as scholars and public officials. The cast and the performance are outstanding and although the story does not end happily, it illustrates how residents in the CHA projects built communities for themselves. The 2.5 hour play (two intermissions) has been extended to June 21. Read my review.

It’s important to note that Paparelli, 40-year-old artistic director and inspiration behind many of ATC’s great productions, was killed in a car accident in Scotland last week. It’s a huge loss for Chicago theater.

Timeline: Inana

Timeline Theatre creates a little bit of London and adds a backstory in Mosul, Iraq, in its new play Inana by Michele Lowe. The story, set in February 2003, is about a museum curator who wants to protect the art and culture of his institution from the looming U.S. invasion. Inana is a 3000-year-old statue of the goddess of love and war; the statue was damaged in an earlier attack. As I said in my review, Inana reminds us that sometimes Americans are the barbarians at the gates. The 90-minute play runs through July 26.

AstonRep: Les Liaisons Dangereuses

This play was adapted from an 18th century French novel that displayed the decadence and arrogance of the aristocracy just before the 1789 Revolution. AstonRep made a gutsy move in taking it on and for the most part, it’s a decent production in the smaller space at Raven Theater. However, the director for some reason decided to set it in 1917 Russia, before that revolution. On the surface, that could add an interesting political twist to the production, except the execution wasn’t carried out very well. It’s still 18th century France in costuming and setting with a few Russian touches. Here’s my review, which notes the memorable 1988 film, Dangerous Liaisons starring John Malkovich, from the same literary source. The AstonRep show runs until June 21.

One lovely film: Clouds of Sils Maria (2014, 124 minutes)

Clouds is an interesting, complex and beautifully filmed story about art, aging and celebrity. Olivier Assayas directs this film, which stars Juliette Binoche and Kristen Stewart. Here’s my mini-review on Letterboxd. Yorick Le Saux’s cinematography of the Swiss Alps is incredibly beautiful. I gave it four stars out of five. It’s in theaters now.

Kafkaesque comedy by Martin Scorcese: After Hours (1985, 97 minutes)

After Hours is 12 nightmare hours in the life of Paul, a word-processor in 1980s New York. Paul’s interest in getting acquainted with a pretty girl in Soho turns into a nightlong quest to just get home. His $20 bill blows out a taxi window, then he can’t take the subway because the fare increased an hour ago. He’s seduced by women, taken for a burglar, chased through the streets by a mob, and encased in a paper-mache sculpture. Is it Kafkaesque? Yes and it’s hilariously funny. It has a film noir quality too. It’s available on DVD.

The hardest working musician….

As I write this, I’m listening to and half watching a June 2009 Bruce Springsteen concert, London Calling: Live in Hyde Park in London. It’s relevant here (but when isn’t Springsteen relevant?) because his music celebrates and mourns for the working class (and he’s the hardest working musician I know). When Bruce comes out on stage in the afternoon in bright sunlight, he’s wearing a light gray-green shirt with jeans and motorcycle boots. By the time he’s singing “Night” (“you work 9 to 5 and somehow you survive until the night”), the third song on the setlist, his shirt is dark with sweat all around his arms and shoulders.

Three songs later, he’s singing “Johnny 99” (a guy who loses his job and gets in bad trouble), and now his shirt is half dark and half light and his hair is soaked with sweat. (If you’ve never seen a Springsteen concert, I have to tell you that he doesn’t just stand in front of a microphone and sing. He’s all over the stage, down on the platform in front of the crowd in the pit. Sometimes he does a backbend off the microphone and at least once he jumps up on the piano to dance. And by the ninth song, “Youngstown,” a labor anthem, the shirt is fully soaked and dark with sweat and it’s dusk at Hyde Park.

But he’s only one-third through the concert, which goes on for hours more. The DVD is almost three hours but he performed for much longer. You can get a feeling for the flow of the concert and the madness of a Springsteen crowd from this trailer. (The guy who joins him near the end for “No Surrender” is Brian Fallon of Gaslight Anthem.)